Source The Art Newspaper by Ben DavisThe tradition of avant-garde political art always looks silly when stacked against the needs of live political movements. (See Julia Bryan-Wilson's recent book "Art Workers: Radical Practice in the Vietnam War Era" for some examples of just how foggyheaded the gestures of even the most politically engaged "art workers" were during the late-'60s.) But given the long decline of left-wing movements over the last 30 years, the conversation about what it means to be a "political artist" has of late become completely compacted into the question of artistic practice itself.> read more

lundi 21 février 2011

Source Indian Express by Georgina MaddoxMore stunning than the party, however, were the artwork from the exhibition, “Vernacular and the Contemporary”, curated by Annapurna Garimella, that are fabulously mounted at the Devi Art Foundation. The show is still up and continues to generate discussion. Earlier this month, critic-curator Nancy Adajania spoke about what was “Contemporary” about these artwork . But to cut back to the past for a little, it was over a glass of wine, on that January night that photographer Ram Rehman remarked how extraordinary the exhibition is and wondered aloud why our modern and contemporary artists have not plugged more into India's rich tradition, instead of turning to the West for inspiration. Pondering this one could raise a question -- Are leading contemporary artists giving craft the wide berth and preferring instead to plug into popular culture or the traditions of High Modernism from Europe and America because craft comes with the baggage of being decorative and anti-intellectual?> read more

jeudi 17 février 2011

Source Art DailySotheby’s sale of Indian and South East Asian Art on 25 March 2011 will be led by one of the most important paintings by a modern Indian painter ever to have appeared on the market. Untitled (Reclining Nude) is one of the highlights of Sotheby’s Asia Week series of auctions in New York and carries an auction estimate of $500/700,000. It was acquired by the current owners from the artist over 50 years ago and has never before appeared at auction. Sotheby’s presented the painting to collectors at the recent Indian Art Summit in New Delhi – the first time it had been returned to India since 1960. It will be on view in New York from the 18th March. > read more

Source The Art NewspaperThe red-hot Christie's evening sale of postwar and contemporary art on February 16 raced to $99,190,888 (£61,380,500), marking the highest London result in the category since June 2008 — the apex of the last art boom. The total annihilated Christie's $61.1 million result from the same sale last February. The sale was powered in part by the previously unrecorded, six-foot-square Andy Warhol "Self Portrait" from 1967 that sold to Larry Gagosian for a staggering $17,441,892 (£10,793,250), over an estimate of £3-5 million. The sale featured 15 other offerings that broke the million pound mark, and 28 that hit over one million dollars. > read more

Source The Art NewspaperTomorrow, organizers in India plan to announce the creation of the emerging economic giant's first-ever major art biennial. Set to debut in 2012, the Kochi-Muziris Biennale will take place in port city of Kochi in the Kerala province on the southwest coast of India, and in neighboring Muziris, known for a rich historical heritage that reaches back to the days when it was a center for spice-trading with the Roman Empire.> read more

Publié par
Herve Perdriolle

mardi 15 février 2011

Source The Wall Street Journal by Tripiti LahiriArtists Durgabai Vyam and her husband Subhash Vyam, who belong to the Gond tribal community and live in Madhya Pradesh, agreed in 2008 to work on the book for Navayana, an eight-year-old Delhi-based publishing house that focuses on caste issues. Mr. Anand says the book is meant to be “a small conversation beginner” and says that even today many Indians don’t actually know very much about Ambedkar, especially in comparison with non-Dalit Indian leaders. In his closing essay, Mr. Anand draws parallels between Mahatma Gandhi and Ambedkar—noting they both took train journeys where they experienced acts of discrimination that clarified for them their place in existing social orders.> read more

lundi 14 février 2011

Source CNN by Deepika Sorabjee All grouped in South Mumbai, and mainly in Colaba, we can truly claim the start of a veritable art district, like the East End of London or the Chelsea Art District in Manhattan. Unlike New Delhi, where one drives long distances from one colony to another, or from one mall to another, the art experience here is holistic. In the first month of the year, I took in a Sudhir Patwardhan show at Sakshi; debated the politics of his works over a machiato at Indigo deli; chatted with the charming Mort Chatterjee and Tara Lal about the restoration of artworks at the Taj Hotel post the 26/11/08 fires; caught Anita Dube at Lakeeren, Ranbir Kaleka at Volte, before Max Streicher’s monumental bobbing horses at Gallery Maskara. With time left to buy neon yellow kolhapuri chappals on Colaba Causeway, I had a conversation over Café Samovar’s kebabs and chai, after joining the busloads that alight at Jehangir Art Gallery. All this while Mumbai’s National Gallery of Modern Art in the same area, lies fallow till the powers that be in New Delhi decide on what handouts we get. Mumbai’s private gallery spaces have stepped up admirably to keep the art scene here vibrant on their own steam. You don’t even need a car, it’s all walkable, like a living urban dream.> read more

dimanche 13 février 2011

Source The Art Newspaper by Cristina RuizThe Belgian foodstuffs baron Guy Ullens is to hand over the management of his contemporary art gallery in Beijing to “long-term partners” and divest himself of the institution. He will also sell in stages the extensive collection of Chinese contemporary art amassed with his wife Myriam, with the first 106 pieces to be auctioned by Sotheby’s in Hong Kong on 3 April. Once he has done this, he says he intends to spend more time on his charitable education work in Nepal and return to collecting young artists, with his focus now on Indian rather than Chinese artists. When asked if he would continue to collect Chinese art, Ullens said: “I don’t want to keep going in the same area,” adding that he was interested now in Indian artists and had recently purchased his first piece by Bharti Kher.> read more

Publié par
Herve Perdriolle

samedi 12 février 2011

Source Livemint by Anindita GhoseThe KNMA opened its new premises at DLF Place, Saket, with a grand party during the India Art Summit last month. Art world moguls were in attendance, as were politicians such as Sheila Dikshit and P. Chidambaram. The museum had been operating temporarily out of the HCL campus in Noida over the last year. Nadar’s husband Shiv Nadar is the founder of HCL. Nadar’s private venture makes for the largest museum of contemporary and modern art in the country. Open 8 hours a day, six days a week, at no entry charge for visitors, her initiative is at the vanguard of a new brand of cultural philanthropy in India. She is preceded by art collectors Lekha and Anupam Poddar, who run the non-profit Devi Art Foundation in Gurgaon. The foundation was established in 2008, and its multi-level exhibition space hosts well-curated rotating exhibitions. But it is the location of Nadar’s museum —in a shopping complex with thousands of visitors everyday—that works to serve Nadar’s vision. She puts it simply, as she walks us through the art she’s been collecting for close to 20 years: “I want art to be accessible to the public.”> read more

Source The Times of India by Neelam Raaj"Don't call it tribal art, " says Garimella who curated the show along with her team at Jackfruit Research and Design. "The term vernacular is more apt as it signifies a traditional art language without the limitations that terms like folk, tribal or native have. " That's how the title Vernacular, in the Contemporary emerged. Craft and contemporary are not "two different worlds", says Garimella. "Though the artists showing at Devi have a committed engagement to traditional knowledge, they are also influenced by the world around them. " For example, Anwar Chitrakar's graphic novel-style patachitra deals with the Maoist movement in Lalgarh. A tailor in Kolkata before he turned to patachitra (a Bengal tradition of storytelling through painted scrolls), he begins his narrative with a question: Lalgarh-er Maobadi na Maobaddider Lalgarh? (Are Maoists from Lalgarh or does Lalgarh now belong to the Maoists?) The 20 painted folios depicting the plight of the Santhal tribals and critiquing politicians are a search for answers. Anwar's familiarity with popular culture is evident in details such as the number 420 written on the pocket of a prisoner. > read more

Source India Today by Nirmala Ravindran"Oh my god, artist Sudarshan Shetty is dead," scream shocked young students at the entrance of the India Art Summit (IAS) in Delhi. They have just chanced upon a tilting statue with an epitaph that reads: Sudarshan Shetty 1961-2010. The bronze-coated, 40-kg figure, tilted at 45 degrees, balanced by coins in an adjoining box connected by a pulley, is the 49-year-old Shetty's take on everything, from the state of Indian democracy to contemporary art. "So it worked," says an excited Shetty, as more reactions poured in.> read more

mercredi 2 février 2011

Source Indian ExpressFictional superhero Superman is now promoting the message of safe sex through an art exhibition here aimed at spreading AIDS awareness and sex education among youth in India. A new exhibition featuring oils on canvas by artist duo Jiten Thukral and Sumir Tagra addresses the themes of safe sex practices and increased sexual activity among Indian youth against the backdrop of traditional perceptions of sexuality. "Superman is every girl's man. He wears latex and saves the world. He is a larger than life character and we have used him as a metaphor to promote safe sex," says Jiten Thukral.> read more

Generali Foundation presents unExhibit on view 4 February – 17 July 2011. The premise of an Exhibit was “no objects, no ideas”: an exhibition composed of colorful panels loosely suspended in space so that visitors could amble between them. This formal decision to do without exhibits and make the display subject of the show can be traced back to a series of attempts in modernism to expand painting into space or to elevate the display to the status of a subject in itself.Image : Willem Oorebeek, "Vertical Club," installation view, 8th Triennale India, New Delhi, 1994, detail.Courtesy the artist. Photo by Aglaia Konrad.> read more

Publié par
hervé perdriolle

mardi 1 février 2011

Source The Art TrustThe Business Standard art writer Kishore Singh, in one of his columns, while depicting tribal art as ‘the next big thing’, has noted: “Precious little has been done so far to position the talented tribal artists alongside their more illustrious ‘urban’ contemporaries (in terms of respectability and value), or create dialogue to bridge the condescension, which keeps apart one school of artist from the other. However, with international collectors now discreetly buying into this segment of the art market, things might change soon.” That indeed seems to be happening!> read more

Source Livemint by Anindita GhoseMost importantly, this was the decade when the creature called the Indian art collector came into being. Up until this decade, serious collectors of Indian art such as Emmanuel Schlesinger and Charles Herwitz had been European or American. Collectors such as Anupam Poddar, Kiran Nadar and Rajshree Pathy are promising additions functioning outside the market realm. Poddar’s 7,500 sq. ft non-profit Devi Art Foundation is in effect India’s first contemporary art museum. And the good news is that the Indian government is working to make this sort of philanthropy tax efficient.> read more

This newsletter posted by Hervé Perdriolle in October 2007, tracks the news of the Indian Contemporary Art through an international press review regularly updated.Since 2008 more than 1.800 press articles listed - 145.000 pages viewed.